


A Flirt and Flutter

by disapparater



Series: Halloweens [10]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Halloween, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-03
Updated: 2013-11-03
Packaged: 2017-12-31 09:37:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1030143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disapparater/pseuds/disapparater
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once upon a midnight dreary, while Draco pondered weak and weary...</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Flirt and Flutter

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [day eleven](http://hd-writers.livejournal.com/261617.html) of hd_writers [Tricks for Treats](http://hd-writers.livejournal.com/253604.html) using all three prompts.

Draco had been working too much. Harry knew this because he'd barely seen him. He was home, but Draco spent hours in his study, sometime even forgetting to come out for meals. Harry would go to bed alone and Draco would join him late in the evening—or early in the morning, Harry was never really sure—before getting up again at some ungodly hour to get straight back to work.

Harry knew the work was important and wouldn't last forever, but it had to have come along in mid-October, didn't it? Draco had said, not two weeks ago, that it was unlikely he'd be able to go to the Halloween party. Draco would be home—he wouldn't leave Harry alone, like he almost had that once, years ago—but he would be working. Harry knew he shouldn't sulk, but he was sulking.

At first Harry had decided to go to the party on his own—his friends would be there and it _would_ be fun. But he had had costume trouble. The trouble being Harry had no idea what to go as. Everything he thought of he'd either dressed as before, or was something always overdone by others. Harry couldn't think of anything original.

Then Harry had had a brilliant idea. So while Draco had spent the last few weeks holed up in his study, Harry had put the time to himself to good use. He'd wanted to do this every Halloween for many years, but had never bother. It had taken him long enough to get around to it, but get around to it he had. It had taken Harry a little over two weeks to perfect the complex _Bestia Mutatio_ spell, allowing him to change his physical form into any animal he wanted for about an hour at a time.

After accomplishing the _Bestia Mutatio_ spell, Harry had changed his mind about going to the party—he'd had a better idea. Knowing Draco would be locked up in his study all Halloween, Harry spent the days leading up to the 31st concocting a brilliant plan. Well, it was either brilliant or stupid, but either way he hoped Draco would be amused—and not angry. He hoped.

The cats had been scared witless when Harry first turned himself into a raven, then once they had adjusted they had tried to catch and eat him—a raven! Abra and Dom were braver than your average cat. Harry had soon transformed himself back into his human form and locked the cats outside.

Having barely seen Draco for more than a passing snog and grope in the hallway or a rushed cup of tea in the kitchen, Harry had yet to tell Draco about his success with the _Bestia Mutatio_ spell. Tonight, Draco was going to find out.

Harry opened the bedroom window, transformed into the raven and flew out. He soared up and flew around above the house for a few minutes, savouring the fresh, free feeling it gave. Eventually he remembered the plan and swooped back down, around the house and to Draco's study window.

Draco could be seen sitting at his desk, poring over large volumes. He looked tired, and Harry hoped after his little surprise, he'd be able to convince Draco to come to bed early.

Before he started, Harry paused and went over the poem again in his head. It was pointless, really; as the raven, Harry had the most simple role in the proceedings.

He rapped his beak lightly against the window.

Draco glanced up quickly towards the door, and if Harry had been capable of it in raven form, he would have smiled.

A second time, Harry tapped his beak just as lightly against the window.

This time Draco stood, taking a step towards the door. Harry saw this mouth move, but Draco must have spoken quietly because Harry could not hear his words.

The next time, Harry knocked his beak hard against the window, and Draco's gaze moved from the door to the window. He was frowning, and Harry wondered if he had yet made the connection. If not, he was about to.

Draco moved to the window and slowly opened it. Making sure to flap his wings far more than necessary, Harry flew over Draco and into the room. He landed on the—thankfully inanimate—bust of Albus Dumbledore that Draco kept on a shelf by the door. It wasn't above the door, but you couldn't have everything.

What Harry could have, was Draco's face going from sad and tired to smiling. (It may have taken that journey via a frown, but it took the journey none-the-less.) Draco looked at Harry knowingly now, and Harry was glad. He figured a messy-feathered ebony raven with bright green eyes was an unusual sight, but one which Draco would figure out quickly.

Still smiling, Draco played along.

“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou 'art sure no craven.” Draco knew his favourite poem by heart, Harry knew, but here he had obviously decided to deviate from the original script, because he simply said, “And who are you?”

Never one for improv, Harry went with his one and only, and overly rehearsed, line: “Nevermore.”

“You won't want to stay here all night watching me work; you'll fly away eventually.”

Harry replied promptly. “Nevermore.”

“Poor thing. Your tiny brain has left you unable to say more than that one word.” Draco was smiling and obviously enjoying his role in the act.

Before either of them said anything else, Draco turned away from Harry and crossed the room. He returned dragging the hideous coffin-shaped sofa Pansy had given them as a post-Halloween thank you gift for setting her up with Percy. She'd called it a loveseat, but Harry called it an uncomfortable and ugly seat. Thankfully Draco had taken it and hidden it in his study so guests wouldn't have to see it.

Leaving the sofa close to the door and facing Harry, Draco settled himself on the violet velvet and leaned his head back to gaze up at Harry. For a time they were silent. Harry let Draco think, perhaps planning his words, or else being silently amused by Harry's raven form.

“You're not a thing of evil,” said Draco eventually, “and I have no lost Lenore.”

“Nevermore,” Harry helpfully supplied.

Draco smiled up at him again. “We're not going to sit like this all night, are we?”

“Nevermore.” Harry sincerely hoped not. He hadn't actually planned how their re-enactment would end. In the poem it didn't, the raven just stills on the bust forever. Harry didn't fancy that.

“Should I just go back to my work?”

“Nevermore!” Harry definitely didn't want _that_.

“You don't want to fly around the house all on your own?”

“Nevermore.”

Draco sighed, but was smiling when he stood up from the coffin-sofa. “Come on then, but the only other place I'm going is to bed.”

This time Harry did deviate from the script—he trilled approvingly.

As Draco opened the study door and exited, Harry swooped down from his place and flew through the door behind him.


End file.
